The Ahmeek plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
70° on Nov. 17, 1953, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1887. Next is 70° in 2023.
Ahmeek’s center stands about 870 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 710 ft to 1,240 ft, a difference of 530 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Mount Horace Greeley, about 1,530 ft, 12 miles east-northeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Portage Lake Volcanics (basalt), from the Mesoproterozoic, 1.1 to 1.1 billion years old.
The section below crosses 5 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 25×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Basalt. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1.1 to 1.1 billion years old. About 14 mi of the line.
Shale, siltstone, arkose. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1 to 1.6 billion years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Conglomerate, sandstone. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1 to 1.6 billion years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Basaltic-andesite. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1 to 1.6 billion years old. About 0.8 mi of the line.
Siltstone, shale, sandstone. Age: Mesoproterozoic, 1 to 1.6 billion years old. About 0.7 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Ahmeek reaches Lake Superior by way of Hills Creek: about 5 river miles. From there it moves on through the Great Lakes, over Niagara Falls and down the St. Lawrence to the Atlantic.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Ahmeek; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Ahmeek has a cold desert climate. Summer afternoons average 75° in July; winter nights fall to about 9° in February. Barely 0.0 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Ahmeek normally reaches 38° and falls to 27°. The record high is 59°, in 1909; the record low 6°, in 1933. The most rain on this date, 0.95 in, fell in 1944.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1887 at Hancock Houghton County Airport, 10 miles south-southwest, 190 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.